Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners speaker advice

Looking to upgrade my ancient Cerwin AT-10's(plus surrounds/center) and have been window shopping the epic60-500 or the epic80-500 systems.I currently have a Denon 1909 and will be using in a 15x13x7(not acoustically treated)room for HT/Music.One concern for me is that the AVR won't handle the 4ohm loads for the M80's but will perform well with the M60's.

How are the M-60's compared to the 80's?I'm confident that these speakers will amaze me in sound quality compared to my current setup.Oh yeah I have never had a subwoofer in my setup before so I am looking forward to that .....lol

Thanks
Jason

The 1909 will handle the M80s just fine, as long as you're not pushing it to very, very high levels. I use a much lesser receiver with good results, although I tend to listen relatively quietly.

Does the 1909 have pre-outs?

Jason, welcome. Your "concern" is at best premature. The 1909 should drive the M80s to beyond a safe listening level at the position where you'd be sitting in a room of slightly below average size such as yours. The M80s are slightly above average in sensitivity and require less power than many other speakers. The impedance varies between about 4 and 14 ohms and roughly averages 6 ohms over its operating range, which should present no problem. If you want the M80s, there's no good reason to hesitate because of a misplaced concern about amplification.

I'm using a Denon 789 (akin to the 1909) and it drives my M80's
to extremes with no problems what so ever. But it does not have pre-outs, aside from the sub.

You will get a kick out of the 500 no matter which mains you pick. That much is assured.

Yes it does have a pre-out.

The 1909 has a sub pre-out but Ken(kcarlile) was referring to the speaker pre-outs, pinja. The 1909 doesn't have them if you wanted to add external amplification to your speakers, you'd have to go up to the 2809 or newer 3310 to get the addition of pre's.

Pretty small room for M80's..... I'd be inclined to go with M60's. I have some M80's in a 13 X 18 X 8 room and they are overkill. I'm more than likely going to downsize to M60's.

Ah, I missed the small room size. Probably not worth doing M80s, then.

I disagree, the M80s shine at lower volume levels which in a smaller room would be more of a normal listening level and the size differential between the M60/M80 is negligible.

I think it kind of depends on some other factors whether the size difference is "negligible". That extra 2" of depth *seems* like it would be significant to me, but I have a lot of other stuff going on in the room.

Love my M60's. I think they'd be perfect in that room.

So you are saying you couldn't pull those M60s out an extra 2" from the wall and not trip over them or have them be an eye sore?

But I must confess when the M80s showed up I did have reservations about those 2 extra inches, but kept them any way as the 60s really didn't fit all that much better in my space and I am sure glad I did as the M80s work great in the new house

Thanks for the input so far guys.This would only be my second set of speakers so how do you owners that have had a wide selection of manufacturers/speakers feel about your Axioms?How do they compare to the competition in this price range?I browse some of the forums and it seems you "Axiomites" love your speakers Heard a couple different Paradigms(Monitor7/9)recently.Not bad I guess better than my current speakers but wasn't blown away from them.

Thanks
Jason

I wasn’t referring the physical size of the M80’s. They simply are not needed and will never be used to their full potential in a room this size. I had to actually set my receiver’s max volume control so it could not inadvertently exceed 0 DB on the receiver. After my remote wigged out on me and ran the volume to 100% one day, it hurt me and my ears were ringing for days afterwards. I made sure that could never happen again…. Getting back to the physical size of the M80’s, I know from my own personal experience, they have to be moved out away from the back wall no less than 6” and 12” is desirable to sound their best. I do not think the M60’s need this much room, but again, I have not had a set of M60’s and am only going off what I’ve heard from other owners.

As far as low volume performance, I had not considered that. I have not heard M60’s so I don’t know first hand how they would compare to the M80’s. I do however find it difficult to believe that there would be a noticeable difference between the two speakers at the same DB when using a sub. What is it about the M80’s that would make them perform better than the M60’s at lower volume?

I would very much enjoy participating in some blind testing with all the Axiom speakers. I think that I would more than likely leave the room with a different perspective than what I have now.

I'm just guessing, having not heard the M60s either, but the M80s with their extra midrange and tweeter, it might be a reasonable conclusion to say they have a little more support in the upper fq's at any volume. All in all, it would be hard to say without directly comparing the two.

I have m80s in a room that is about 13.5x22x8 and they sound absolutely amazing. Definitely NOT overkill for me.

I guess my biggest concern is using M80's at high levels and the protection circuit activating due to temps.My Cerwins are a 4ohm speaker and that has happened twice to me at high levels during movies.

Running your CV's full range would be more taxing on your receiver than the M80's I believe due to the woofers on the CV. I'm not sure of the CV's efficiency rating but the M80's are very efficient.

Once you get the M80's and new sub, the sub will be self powered freeing up watts/power for the mains as running the M80's small or with bass management would redirect low frequencies to the sub.

The whole time I was reading that post, I was wondering how to hook speaker wire up to CV.

One to each ear, I would think. Maybe nostrils.

I'm one of those crappy wireless speakers.

CrappyVox?

Then where are you storing the batteries?

Between my humiliation and guilt.

One of the design goals that is very common among Cerwin Vega speakers is their efficiency - very easy to power. If I was a wagering man, without even knowing the specs of the CV's I bet they are more efficient than the M80's.

IIRC at least one model I checked out was 102dB.

Speaking of efficient speakers, apparently Tannoy made a driver for a lighthouse foghorn with a 6" coil and 500 watts of handling capacity which achieved an efficiency of 142 db at 1 metre for 1 watt input and supposedly took 2 men to lift the magnet.

AAAHH---OOOOOHHH---AAAHHHH!!!

Talk about a one note wonder...

I have done some rudimentary blind testing and when A/B'd the difference was noticeable to myself and Mojo. The 60s are just a bit more laid back in the upper ranges, which to my ears sounded ever so slightly muffled/compressed. I would bet you would prefer the M60s over the M80s you have since you run the 80s with the resistor. I found once volume levels increased, say 85db and up, the M60/M80 differences were negligible. The 60s seemed to open up and become more spatial.

Thanks for all your help guys.Guess I could order the M80's and run them with the amp and see how it goes.Worst case scenario would be looking at those sweet,sweet speakers and then having to send them back for the M60's.

Enjoy the weekend.
Jason

If you have to send them back for M60s, it still isn't much of a drop in performance. I am sure most would not notice the differences I have mentioned. We do tend to be very picky about some things around here. I have stated I wished I could have kept the M60s, I really started to enjoy them before the M60s arrived.

Adrian, that would appear to be a remarkable feat of energy creation, if accurate. An acoustic watt, at one meter, results in roughly a 112dB SPL. So a 100% efficient speaker would have about a 112dB sensitivity number. A 1% efficient speaker would be about 92dB for 1 watt input, and typical speakers with sensitivity numbers in the high 80s are about 1/2% efficient at turning electrical power into acoustical power.

This info is from a book called "The Tannoy Story" by Julian Alderton, I haven't read it, but it was mentioned on the thread where I read the Tannoy Foghorn story in brief.